Voting for Romanians living abroad

The Foreign Ministry runs public information campaign about voting in the parliamentary elections of 11 December for Romanian nationals living abroad.

Leyla Cheamil, 07.09.2016, 13:53

According to a government decision, the
parliamentary elections will be held on 11 December. To this end, the Foreign
Ministry is running a public information campaign on ways of voting while
residing abroad. Ministry employees are distributing information literature and
applications to register into the Election Registry. Romanians living abroad
have a deadline to register as voters by September 14. Foreign Ministry
spokesperson Ionut Valcu urged citizens to fill in the applications, saying
that it only involves a few easy steps:

You can download the application from the
Foreign Ministry website, or you can get it from the Romanian diplomatic and
consular offices abroad. You need to fill in the application, tick one of two
options, voting by mail or if you want to have a polling station opened close
to where you reside abroad. Step two is to attach copies of papers documenting
the fact that you reside abroad. In the case of Romanian citizens who have
established residence abroad, they only need to attach a copy of their
passports with residence in a foreign country, and in the case of people who
continue to reside on Romanian territory, it is sufficient to attach a copy of
their identity cards or passports, plus a copy of the documents issued by the
state of residence attesting their residence in that particular state.

The ministry spokesperson said that the
applications to register to vote have to be filed with the nearest consulate or
embassy or be posted or e-mailed. The Permanent Election Authority announced on
Monday that 8,364 applications have been filed by residents abroad so far. Of
them, 6,205 say they wish to vote by mail, while 2,159 have opted for going to
a polling station. The Permanent Election Authority has specified that the
applications to register for voting by mail have been filed in 40 countries,
while the ones opting for polling stations were registered in 33 countries. The
localities abroad where the minimum threshold of 100 voters was reached in
order to set up a new polling station were Soroca and Causeni in the Republic
of Moldova.

In the 2014 election, thousands of Romanians
wishing to exercise their right to vote had to wait in very long lines in major
European cities such as Paris, London, Vienna and Munich. It remains to be seen
what the level of interest will be in the parliamentary elections this winter.